Lunacy
by Arbutus
Summary: Eirin recalls her flight from the lunar capital during several visits with Keine, gaining the attention of an eavesdropping Mokou. A story about life and death.
1. Prologue: The Marshal

_Usual disclaimer, I claim nothing and everything belongs to its owner. All the epigraphs are from the Keene translation of _Tale of the Bamboo Cutter.

**Prologue: The Marshal**

_This child had a purity of features quite without equal anywhere in the world, and the house was filled with a light that left no corner dark. _

_If ever the old man felt in poor spirits or was in pain, just to look at the child would make the pain stop. _

_All anger too would melt away._

* * *

><p>The silken pennants that usually flew from every corner of the palace roof were gone. Woven into a strange, almost weightless fabric that floated to full length without the slightest breath of wind, the long, thin banners stood out distinctly under any light. In their absence the gibbous earth was left to illuminate the dark silhouettes of the palace buildings alone.<p>

This moment would be etched in the memory of many of the citizens of the capital, as very few could possibly remember the flags having ever been struck. Those familiar with protocol might recall it even more vividly: combat-ready troops were likely already stationed and on full alert.

Soft footsteps, betrayed only by the planks on which they fell, came closer and closer to the main entrance of the physician's chambers in the princess's wing. The violent staccato of hard sandals had died out over an hour ago and the occupant of the room knew that the soft shoes must belong to an elite officer: only they were required, even in times of war, to wear full dress regalia in the palace.

Apparently noticing the officer as well, the acting commander of her personal guard turned and walked out to meet him. Little of their rushed conversation was audible, but what she heard confirmed two of Eirin's suspicions: her own palace guardsmen had arrested her on military, not royal, authority, and the man who had ordered it, standing outside her open door, was a lunar marshal. Royal assent must have been granted to a declaration of martial law if a military official was arresting civilians.

The guard returned and prompted his men to leave. Eirin heard a loud, single _clomp_ through the thin walls as the troops saluted the officer in step, before they fell to the hard ground and disappeared along pathways running to the main palace, the Marshal's men (none youkai) taking their place.

She recognized him as he passed a round window and then came into full view in the doorway. He was one who preferred to be addressed by his title, and he wore the plain white uniform of trousers and coat of his office. His face was not severe, but this was only because he did not allow it to betray his feelings.

Or he tried not to. He couldn't keep his eyes from widening when he saw the half-empty vial on the table where his captive sat, snatching it to smell its contents. Recognizing the mild sedative, he put it down and sat on the floor across from her, not bothering to conceal his relief. Eirin slouched slightly further, and her eyes were unfocused. Her flesh appeared paler than usual and she was obviously wracked with fatigue.

"Your guards tell me that you have taken no nourishment since your arrest," he began in a level, probing tone. "And one has heard from the kitchen staff that you have been unable to stomach anything but water, tea, or broth. It may be fine for a physician as skilled as yourself to live off of supplements and abstain from food for some time, but I am not a doctor and you have given me little reason to trust your recent medical decisions. A meal is being brought up, which you will eat in full while I answer the questions that I suspect you wish to ask. Then we are going to talk."

As if he had been waiting for this cue, a servant flanked by two soldiers carried in a tray buried under a various delicacies and set it down before Eirin, then poured two cups of tea. They all left, none bowed.

She made no move to touch the food, but the Marshal reached across the table and picked up a slice of fish with his fingers, ignoring the tableware. He chewed and swallowed with his eyes on her, then swallowed a mouthful of tea and exhaled. Eirin realized that she had been following his motions very deliberately, and for a moment had forgotten her situation. She blinked when she realized that he was staring back at her.

"It may have been the fear of capture that kept you from hunger. If so, that fear should now be absent. If instead it was your guilt that staid your appetite, I would suggest that you start eating regardless. That will not leave you so easily, and you will surely need to eat before it does."

With voice given to her thoughts she had no excuse to ignore them. She took a bite of something grilled but needed a mouthful of tea to swallow, and didn't taste either.

"Take your time.

"Your charge, the Princess Kaguya, has been placed under house arrest. The legality of such an arrest had been called into question, the legal status of immortals is unclear despite your… well… _detailed_ exploration of the subject, so martial law was declared. If she is to be tried it will be by court martial, making some convenience of the technicality that royals officially serve from birth. Your advice on this matter has left quite a legal tangle, but it will soon be dealt with. Any delay may serve those who would use this calamity to further their political interests." He took another bite of fish and the sound of chewing filled her skull. Before beginning to speak again he swallowed some more tea and poured himself another cup. Eirin was making slow progress, so he went on.

"I cannot currently discuss with you the means by which suspicions arose and were confirmed with regards to her current condition, as you are a suspected accomplice. Actually, though I have no doubt that you did so, do you confess to preparing an Elixir of Life?"

After a pause she nodded and continued eating. He showed his palms.

"Then here we are. You can obviously see the need for us to reach a quick resolution. Although the Royal Family is distraught I imagine that their political advisers are even more agitated. Their advice may trigger hasty decisions, and the presence of the Princess threatens the sanctity of the capital. Security necessitates expediency in this matter. I see you are nearly done, so allow me to pour another cup of tea before we start."

He did so, and Eirin pushed the tray to the side before proffering her own cup for a refill. When all was squared away the marshal looked at her until she met his eyes, and then spoke with a new seriousness.

Time was passing too quickly. She suddenly wished she hadn't finished eating.

"Did you…"

She shook her bowed head before he finished.

"Eirin Yagokoro, you are a traitor both to your oath and your office, and to your patron."

Hearing it said so plainly by a voice of authority drove the full weight of her betrayal home, and she couldn't stop a sharp intake of breath from catching in her throat. What the Princess had done to her critical mind was so bizarre. Her odd, innocent fascination with strange things had been impossible to escape, and although they were misplaced, the way that Kaguya's fears pierced Eirin was all too real.

Seeing that she was not prepared to talk, the Marshal decided to start a little less bluntly. "I seem to recall having had a particular academic article forced before my eyes many times during my education, and I have always found the insight that it offered difficult to forget. It was a piece intended as a discussion of medical ethics, but since its publication it has gained notoriety as a treatise on philosophy and the nature of our species. It's full title was quite long, but it framed and presented a conclusion on the implications of human immortality. You are familiar with it."

"...am." Eirin spoke for the first time, her voice hoarse from disuse. "I am," She repeated after clearing her throat. "I wrote it."

"It has become required reading for students in many fields, as you know, and it starts quite interestingly by claiming that 'human immortality' is in fact an oxymoron; quite a controversial assertion at the time. It has been a while, and of course you articulated these ideas with much more talent than I can currently muster, but perhaps I can prompt your memory.

"Humans might age or be ageless, or so the essay says, but human lives must be thought of as a set of events: deeds, ideas, emotions, so that in ending one might look back upon a life and see it as a comprehensive collection. 'People' die, you said, but immortals, who live forever, undergo all events countless times, regrowing, forgetting, transforming. The time over which they live erodes to nothing the 'person' that they once were, or are, or will become, again, and again, and again, and they are fully aware as it is happening of one thing: that there is no escape, that the meaning of their actions will not only be forgotten, but eclipsed again and forever in and endless pseudo-cycle. In fact, I recall now that in trying to find a name for this kind of being you reached a strange, but interesting conclusion that even I am still not prepared to agree with. But you are smarter than I am." He paused and waited.

"Mon..." She paused and inhaled a deep, shaky breath before trying again. "Monstrosities."

He gestured her to continue, so she finished the passage more loudly than she had intended: "Monstrosities who must forever churn in torment. That is what I wrote." The room returned quickly to silence, and Eirin didn't think she could break it. Fortunately the Marshal decided to do so himself.

"I hope you can understand my confusion then, since I do not suspect that your actions are an indication of a change in your opinion." Again he paused as if expecting confirmation, with the familiarity of one speaking to a common partner in conversation, but again Eirin let the silence hang.

"I suppose that I cannot hope to understand your actions, but I hope that you do not think I am enjoying this," he said. Eirin was taken aback so much that she blinked: he was clearly reconsidering his opinion of her.

"I don't think you're enjoying this!" She exclaimed, too hastily. Then, to balance: "I think that if you were less of a professional you would enjoy this."

Eirin's words made him smile.

"I still do not resent you, or the advice you have given the court recently, and fewer others do than you think. I am not a politician, and the choice to phase out the Marshals as chief military authority was not yours alone. I was surprised at your reasoning at first, maybe, but I think the Watatsuki sisters will be capable leaders, and having a lineal head of the military may prove beneficial. After all, they learned everything important from you, although that may soon count for little in the political arena."

This surprised Eirin. If he was telling the truth then the marshals that were currently in office had hidden their sentiments well. Were the resentment and military backlash she feared all a fabrication of her stressed mind? Possibly, but the marshals had always aptly concealed their intentions, and if they could hide their indifference they could hide their displeasure, which is what she had been expecting them to feel when told that a further layer of military command would be placed between them and the crown.

"If you fear for your career because of your ties to me, then there is an easy way to fix it." She said, knowing his answer.

"I do fear for my career, and because of that I will not take that path. I will carry out my task as my station demands. Besides, I had more reason to fear for my career when Marshal was still an official office."

"They will cry for our blood, and you will not be a marshal for much longer. Can you really expect that rumours will not surface?" Eirin's voice had been falling, and now she was whispering. "That you were my pawn all along, ready to bail me out?"

He drank. His eyes narrowed. "What makes you think that you will be saved by me?" She could see that she had driven a wedge back between them. "That you were once my teacher and remain my mentor? Do not forget that I came to you first as a _lawyer_ requesting tutelage, a scholar of laws, and that that remains my profession and the practice to which I shall return in full once my tenure in the military concludes. You are still mortal, so the law courts carry undeniable jurisdiction over you. Furthermore, regarding this princess whom I have only ever seen at court and whom I now must try as an immortal, I knew you for a long time before her, and even on the eve of her birth I would never have imagined that the bulk of your brilliant mind might crumble as it has at her gentle smile." A gradual crescendo carried the marshal to the end of his outburst. Incredulously, Eirin tried to respond, but he cut her off almost immediately.

"I didn't…"

"…Don't tell me what you did and did not do. When someone like you, with millennia of experience in nearly every field, by far the most brilliant and creative mind in our entire society is swayed... Eirin, you possess the most adept and subtle intelligence that I have ever known. Some called me one of the most convincing debaters in history while I was at law and you could still effortlessly convince me of anything. Whenever there was something I didn't understand or I had some new idea that needed the right words to take shape you would patiently sit and lead me down a path that you seemed to know by heart to every important epiphany that I have ever had. You may think that I..." Eirin tried to cut in, but he cut her off again: "No, don't speak, I am going to finish." He paused, and although he expected that Eirin would ignore his request she remained silent and attentive, more attentive than before. His abandonment of his careful concealment had surprised them both.

"It may seem like I am envious. I know that I have always been too competitive and sometimes malicious, but it is not because I was not the one to break you that I am now frustrated. And you were broken, make no mistake, there is nothing else to be said. She broke you."

Eirin remained silent, sensing his desire to continue. "How did this happen to you? An elixir of immortality, Eirin, when you wrote the book? You wrote the _book_ Eirin, you decried it yourself so convincingly that it _became_ law. You convinced the soldiers, the artists, the politicians, the whole moon, why couldn't you convince one more child?

"So now I have to go stand before this girl who wore such an iconic scholar so thin. I must stand before her as a soldier and a scholar myself even though I am so much weaker than you. You could not stand there, so what will become of me? I know why you thought I was enjoying this, you were thinking that maybe I wouldn't mind being remembered as the first judge of an immortal in history. But we both know that such a memory will be short-lived. I will be remembered only as the representative of the moon who condemned an immortal to death. My name will become synonymous with futility and inability and ineptitude all while I wear the uniform of a disappearing military rank, and I wonder, will you feel for _my_ career? You knew this would happen, maybe not that it would be me who caught on, but you knew someone would need to take the stage and play the fool. Even if I am written about in history as a legal icon she will be in exile—and she will eventually be exiled—with any impact I may have had long forgotten. Slowly my image will change and I know that your sympathy for me will drown in that which you bear her."

The marshal drew another breath as if to go on, but then exhaled, tired. He finished his lukewarm tea and this reminded Eirin of her own, so she drank with him. "Yes," she said, without thinking.

They both became aware of the guards again at the same time, and of the many ears that they had both uncharacteristically forgotten. "You must remain in confinement. Military guards will be posted alongside your own. As her personal physician, you will confirm the execution, so I would imagine that you will be reporting a number of failures to me in the next while. You will only get to see her at those times, but my men will be guarding her and they will not interfere with you if you do not always seem to be practicing medicine. I will come for a report at the required intervals." And without any courtesy he stood and left.

Sandals on the wood sounded again and two men came to stand at either side of the door and every window. They shut it, and silence flooded the room. Through one circle the distant, tiny earth that had somehow filled the princess's imagination hung stationary in the sky. In Eirin's mind the Marshal was speaking: "…I condemn you in the name of..."

Nearly every mechanism in whatever process was about to take shape, from the elixir to the court to the charges being laid, had in some way doubtlessly been influenced by her. Sometimes it seemed as though she had constructed a strange machine.

Sitting in the deafening silence of a warmly lit room surrounded by perfect darkness, her vision blurred. The seventy-second hour of lunar night had just passed.

* * *

><p><em>Its been too long. Sorry about that, if you cared: time has a habit of slipping away from me.<em>

_This will be a longer project than any I've posted here, and though it's been in the pipes for a while I feel that an update schedule might push me a little more_. _Lets aim for weekly updates for now, shall we? Subject to change. I'll comment more on the upcoming chapters and freshen my profile too, maybe even revise my older stories while I'm doing so. Maybe this can even be kept to schedule. Comment for any reason please; I hold praise nearly as dear as criticism. And I should probably say at this point that most of this story will take place in familiar settings with familiar characters, if you were put off by the foreign prologue._


	2. The Party

**The Party**

_Every man in the realm, whether high or low of rank, could think of nothing but of how much he wanted to win Kaguya-hime, or at least to see her. Just to hear the rumours about her made men wild with love. … _

_Five among them, renowned as connoisseurs of beauty, persisted in their suit._

* * *

><p>As near a perfect circle as anyone could tell, the full moon was slowly rising as the last traces of a fiery sunset were dissolving in the western sky. It had been a cloudy morning, and when those clouds had lingered until the afternoon some began to worry, but the early evening sun had shone regularly and by nightfall the only clouds left were on the horizon.<p>

The Lunar Exhibition had drawn larger crowds than its patron had anticipated: interest in lunar culture seemed ubiquitous amongst the residents of Gensokyo, and those who came with skepticism soon found those feelings forgotten. Guests had been arriving since late morning and few had left. When they tired they were offered the opportunity to enjoy some of the palace's numerous amenities (after which it became obvious that the aliens were no less fond of spirits than any of the natives), and as the day wore on more and more guests found themselves lounging on the soft cushions and sun-warmed planks adorning the mansion, anticipating the evening's festivities.

Two guests had remained deadlocked at one exhibit throughout the day—although neither gave any indication of it—and only by nightfall were they beginning to consider joining the party. Keine Kamishirisawa and Patchouli Knowledge had been shocked to find certain texts that both had only heard rumours of. How the alien physician had obtained them escaped the two academics: some had been published since the Lunarian's arrival on earth.

Written in a Lunar language, the two could grasp only superficially the concepts in the magical texts, and they both eventually accepted as obvious the fact that even for one of them a single day would not be enough time with the books. Both decided to speak to Eirin when exchanging pleasantries. Besides, Eientei's smooth liquor, the finest sake available, was beginning to make their heads swim.

That sake was served from trays carried by wandering rabbit youkai who were becoming less and less able to manage them. Under normal circumstances a stern word from their Lunarian superior might have coaxed them into behaving, but today she had already far surpassed their stage of misconduct.

Many noticed that the buzzing swarms of mosquitoes which had been choking the air for days had been driven out by clouds of fireflies. Fewer correctly guessed why this was, but nonetheless a certain youkai was basking in the attentions of several guests who had identified her as the cause of this good fortune and wanted to share their appreciation. Most seemed to be doing so by bearing more of their skin than was usually polite, perhaps because they felt it was no longer threatened by pests.

Whatever one's sentiments towards her in general, one had to conclude that the Princess Kaguya, or at least her servants, could throw a party.

* * *

><p>It's true, at any rate, thought Mokou as she disentangled herself from a deteriorating conversation. She could throw a party, and free drinks never hurt anyone.<p>

Well, not her anyways. Permanently.

She had planned to come regardless, but Keine's insistence had given her an excuse that made the day more palatable. While Mokou had been somewhat frustrated when her friend had become absorbed by those books, surprisingly little time had passed before she was enjoying the company of the other guests. The entertainment was… entertaining, too, and early on she decided to enjoy herself for as long as Kaguya didn't catch her doing so.

When she stepped outside to clear her head a teetering Reisen stumbled into her, flailing frantically for something to keep her balance. Not the small Reisen, as apparently there were two, but the one with whom she was most familiar. Kaguya's pet. Very drunk, probably beyond the point where her memories of the night could ever be recovered, the lunar rabbit was somehow still articulate enough to welcome the guest against whom she was leaning with nearly her full weight.

"Mokou!" She half-squealed with glazed eyes and a giant smile as she grabbed at her shoulders. "...I don't know if I should be surprised or not to see you..."

Mokou tensed. "Don't be surprised, I guess. No one else is." She was enjoying the drink in her hand a little to much to want to address that sentiment, so she turned the discussion elsewhere. "You seem to be having a pleasant time. I wonder how your master feels about that."

Reisen fell to the edge of the planks that wrapped the mansion in decking and took on what she likely thought was an expression of seriousness. The effect was poorly served by the fact that in sitting down, and pulling a well-humored Mokou with her, she had let her skirt ride up well past her thighs. "You know Mokou, if I worried about that nothing good could happen…" only one of her shoulders was in her jacket and very few of her buttons were done up. "I'll be honest with you. Listen up..."

Reisen didn't speak for a few seconds, frozen mid-gesture. Too long a pause, really. But as Mokou was about to utter the prompt that Reisen seemed to be expecting the rabbit started again. "Tewi gave me something to drink, you might have noticed, and I'm not gonna remember aaaaanything." The Rabbit was swinging her legs and staring at the moon with all of her severely limited attention, and Mokou, not wanting to disturb her brief contentment and certain that no answer was forthcoming, got up to leave.

Reisen grabbed her leg with shocking accuracy and found her eyes.

"It's good you came," she said, and before Mokou could digest that seemingly layered comment, Reisen spoke. "Let's train again sometime."

A furrow crossed Mokou's brow. The moon rabbit was now lying on the boards, and she raised a hand with two fingers pointed at Mokou's face. "Pfff," she said, and her arm fell. A smile formed on Mokou's face at the memory of tricking Reisen into shooting her in a training exercise after she'd captured her once. Reisen could evidently remember her sober life quite well.

"Enjoy yourself," Mokou said.

"Likewise." Reisen's eyes were closed, and another stumbling rabbit was making her way over with a blanket and cushion. Mokou walked off.

She passed by a few rooms with certain groups in conversation or listening to the kinds of anecdotes that don't usually surface before the eighth drink, and raucous laughter punctuated spells of rapt attention of the sort that only drunk audiences are capable of displaying towards a drunk subject. Some others were being carried off by friends or servants to more comfortable quarters. She saw Keine, Patchouli, and Eirin through one of the circular windows that were characteristic of Eientei, the trio were lounging and nursing cups of tea, and discussing quite comfortably something far beyond her grasp. She moved on.

The moon had recently passed its zenith, and the party seemed to have timed its climax to match. Drowsiness was creeping through the liquor-saturated mansion.

Rounding a corner, Mokou found herself somewhere where the decking widened before a main entrance. She was struck by a round of applause and cheering. Kaguya backed out of an opening door in a regal bow, sliding the door shut with the grace of a princess. Despite that grace, when the doors were closed she let her modesty slip for a moment, and a smile of elation slipped past her composure. She turned as if to face the moon, humming happily as she opened her eyes...

…which promptly fell on Mokou's own, a few feet away, and ended their skyward trek.

The appearance of the other made each of them wonder how they themselves must appear. Kaguya looked the same as always, though her smile was more pronounced and her head a little more bowed, her cheeks flushed from drink and she was swaying slightly. Mokou was in similar shape: exaggerating expressions and gestures, missing a bow or two in her hair. One suspender had snapped off too. Those musings were cut short by the realization of how long they'd been standing there.

It simultaneously dawned on both of them that tactfully avoiding someone three feet from you, in direct eye contact with you, and with whom you are totally alone was essentially impossible. Even if they were currently aggressors, they were also both nobility, and tonight they were guest and hostess. To make matters worse, Mokou had forgotten to stop smiling. She stopped.

A tray was balanced haphazardly on the edge of the deck, so Kaguya glided over to it and poured two cups of sake. She stood with the first and offered it to Mokou with both hands, who stared into the clear spirit but didn't drink. Sitting back on her legs by the tray, hardly taking up any space, Kaguya lifted her own cup. "Enjoying yourself?" She asked quietly, just before taking a sip.

Mokou sat down heavily. "No." She started to drink anyways, though, and shifted around to sit against a pole. "Your servants get lazy?"

"No. They left all the trays and bottles lying around because they couldn't carry them. Usually Reisen would mange to stop that kind of thing but I haven't seen her for a while." Kaguya took a sip, barely tipping the shallow dish. "It worked out pretty well anyways, they seem to be in all the right places."

Mokou had set down her empty cup, so Kaguya finished hers and refilled them both. They both sat silently through another drink.

And another.

"You know," Mokou started, "I saw Reisen earlier..."

"She was still awake during the party, then?"

Mokou clenched her cup. Frustration at the interruption threatened to push her dwindling attention away from her thought, and she struggled to grasp it again. "Yeah, wait, let me finish..." They both took another drink. "Party seemed successful," she said, to which Kaguya nodded and gave an assenting murmur. "So anyways, Reisen somehow made me notice... well, not really notice, but... hey, pour another one. No, you're giving me more, let me do it. Here." A brief scuffle over the bottle ensued, and somehow four full cups resulted, so they both drank two and Mokou continued. "She said that no one was surprised to see me here, and it's true."

A wave of laughter broke over them from behind, momentarily deafening them to the gentle breeze.

"Why would anyone be surprised?" Kaguya asked, when her quiet voice could again be heard against the muted voices. "It's a party, everyone is here."

"That's not the point. Why do people expect me to show up at your parties," Mokou pointed at Kaguya, startling herself when some of her liquor spilled, "...is what I'm trying to say."

Kaguya seemed to think about this, and in all likelihood she had an insightful and poetic answer, but she didn't give it. The noise of the party grew more distant. "Why do you come?"

"You want me to... nevermind." Mokou looked away from the cheery, if fatigued princess, and took another drink. The sooner she passed out, the sooner she could end this discussion.

"Why would they expect you not to come, then?" Kaguya offered.

Mokou squeezed her cup harder. "That should be obvious."

They stopped talking for a minute, had a few drinks, and then in a brief moment of lucidity Mokou found another thought.

"Kaguya, I know when we talk you bounce around me to get to me, but I want to say something serious." The princess's eyes were closed, and it seemed like the use of her name had found her attention. "I saw Keine earlier with Eirin. I know how smart she is, some of the villagers I bring here think she has divine powers." That notion distracted Kaguya for a moment.

"I saw them too," she said at length.

"Well, you've been throwing these parties, so you must want more contact with… well… everyone? I guess? Outsiders? Keine hasn't got many, uhh…" mokou froze as her mind stumbled frantically after the word. "_Academic_ companions." Kaguya nodded.

"So you'd expect that they might be friends if not for us. We should feel guilty, shouldn't we? It makes it seem like we think our time is more valuable than theirs. I know you're incapable of guilt, but..." Kaguya coughed and sputtered. She eyed Mokou's hint of a smile, falling into a search for her thoughts.

"They were not alone," the princess interjected, recovering from her loss of composure. "The Scarlet Devil's Librarian was there, and nothing keeps her from joining either of them."

Mokou paused. "She stops herself, I think, but it doesn't matter. If it's us who does it to them, Keine and Eirin, is what matters."

"...Maybe," Kaguya said.

The moment had passed, and both remembered who they were talking to. They fell into another silence, but not an unpleasant one: the liquor softened the atmosphere and both were growing tired.

"You know," Kaguya started. "That was a strange thing you said just now, about Eirin having divine powers."

Mokou didn't really want to hear why Kaguya thought this, but the princess had started speaking while she was mid-sip and had her attention. "What makes you say that? It makes sense that the people who see her and don't know anything about healing might think she was helped by a deity."

"Maybe, but would they still think of her projects as divine if they knew us?"

Mokou, knowing nothing short of a poetic response to match her rival's would satisfy her, and feeling the first waves of truly impairing inebriation slip over her, decided to change the subject once again.

"I'm getting drunk enough now to the point where I don't want to say anything I might regret, and I bet the same is happening to you. So why not take the opportunity on this lovely night while you're riding the high of a successfully hosted party and slipping away on expensive sake, to apologize for besmirching the reputation of my father and family?"

Kaguya seemed to seriously consider this, and must finally have decided to pretend to pass out.

_Damn_, thought Mokou. Long shot anyways. The Princess had fallen on a large cushion that seemed to Mokou to have appeared from nowhere, although it had likely been there for some time. In fact, upon turning around she found her own similar piece of furniture.

Kaguya betrayed her feint when she heard Mokou lay down. "Would you really want me to say it now, even if I would?" She whispered, then: "...Mokou?"

Mokou pretended to be asleep, her mind swimming in alcohol, and didn't let the facade slip until she had actually drifted away.

* * *

><p>Kaguya opened her eyes to see the moon now less than half its width from the horizon, which had the curious optical effect of making it seem larger. She drew herself to her knees for a moment and then stood, wrapping her hands in the sleeves of her dress to fend off the cold. Some of the servants had come by and thrown blankets over the pair where they slept (although Kaguya's seemed to have been tucked around her with slightly more precision than her guest's had) and she was thankful for it: even though the night had been warm, the earliest hours before sunrise were cold enough to chill someone in their sleep.<p>

She walked noiselessly away in the direction from which Mokou seemed to have come the night before. Fortunately, she had had the good sense to dilute her drinks while entertaining so she might maintain her demeanour, and only just before she had stumbled into Mokou had she started to feel their effects. As a result she felt no pain or indigestion, but was still slightly drunk. She had slept for maybe four hours.

Straightening the bows and creases in her dress as she walked she realized that some of the wrinkles from falling asleep in it, and outside no less, would be impossible to remove casually. Her hair must also have taken a long stride from its immaculate appearance at the start of the event, and her face was very likely still flushed, but for now those problems could wait.

She came round a corner and saw the highest leaves of the bamboo thicket turning bright green in the gentle sunrise. Turning her attention to the windows, she looked amongst the sleeping guests for... ah, there. A small room with a table and three cushions and a low bookshelf. One cushion was empty but depressed as if recently vacated, the other housed a deeply sleeping tiny form buried in blankets, and a groggy Keine Kamishirisawa was sitting, face in her hands, on the third.

"Miss Kamishirisawa!" She whispered, "Keine! Sensei!" When she received no response she decided to approach her, and whispered from her side, "Keine," to which the half-human responded. Keine looked surprised to see Kaguya, as though she had been expecting somebody else, but she followed the princess outside and away to a place where they could talk.

"Princess, please forgive me." Keine rubbed her eyes, blinking in the twilight. "I am still hardly awake and I haven't properly thanked you for your hospitality. Eirin just left for some food, I thought you were her."

Kaguya brushed off the apology. "It was my pleasure. The event went well, don't you think? An excellent turnout." Keine nodded in sincere agreement: it could hardly have gone any better.

"We spoke yesterday when I was touring the exhibits, if you remember. I recall you staying at the one on lunar literature, but I didn't see you anywhere else until I saw you last night in that room."

Keine let out a sigh and a tired smile. "You're right," she said, putting her hand to her forehead and closing her eyes, "I became quite absorbed. And even after, when the Vampire's Librarian and I approached Eirin about some of those texts, she took us aside and we talked until only two hours ago. I'm sorry for drawing your servant away from the party."

"Don't apologize for that. You all enjoyed yourself, right? I'm actually happy that you kept Eirin company for so long." Kaguya remembered the dozy rabbits. "Preparations had the house up in arms for days and she works hard, so it's good if she gets to talk with people who share her interests."

"I do enjoy our chats..." Keine trailed off, seeming concerned about something, unsure of how to approach it with her oblivious, smiling host. "Uh, I brought Mokou along yesterday. I sort of planned to use your politeness to my advantage in having her let in, but I didn't really see you until now and she lost interest in those books. I'm sorry, at the time it seemed alright but talking to you makes me doubt myself. I hope I haven't overstepped my boundaries as a guest..."

"Oh no." Kaguya reassured her. "She comes here all the time, even if there isn't an event. I don't turn her away then and it's not out of politeness, I certainly wouldn't when I am hosting."

Keine seemed pleased that the little Princess had so poignantly diffused her concerns. She had the feeling that Kaguya could deliberately mediate the levels of awkwardness or frustration a person felt, while making them feel that it was their fault for feeling that way. "I'm glad," she started, her expression becoming concerned, "I get restless thoughts sometimes about you two..."

"I see. When I saw her last night...

"She was here into the night?" Keine seemed to jerk fully awake in surprise. She'd thought Mokou must have left once she became tired of entertaining herself.

"She's still here now, she's sleeping. Last night, before I met her, we both saw you and Miss Knowledge and Eirin talking together. We know that you have trouble finding people to share your interests with, but despite that you don't really have a relationship that goes beyond incidental meetings."

Keine was about to respond, but Kaguya continued.

"I actually want to talk about that for a minute."

* * *

><p>I'm having trouble deciding what genre to call this, I'm open to suggestions and I may change it later. Tell me what you think. Do let me know about any errors that have missed my scrutiny, as this is still unavoidably a work in progress<p> 


	3. The Scholars, I

**The Scholars, I**

"_For a thousand days the Prince remained in hiding together with us lowly workmen, and he ordered us to make him a magnificent jewelled branch. He promised he would even give us official posts as our reward. Recently we thought the matter over carefully, and it occurred to us that the branch was surely the one demanded by Kaguya-hime, the Prince's future lady. That is why we have come to this household, to receive our just reward."_

…

_At their cry Kaguya-Hime, whose spirits had been steadily darkening as the day drew to a close, suddenly burst into merry laughter._

* * *

><p>Kaguya must have said something to them, because a few weeks after the exhibition the lunar rabbit brought her master along on a medical supply run and deposited her, along with a small package, at Keine's house. Mokou heard the pair speaking before she was noticed, and recognized from afar the odd collection of books that had been on display at Eientei. The physician was obviously explaining some of the nuances and details of the magical texts that the historian was incapable of gleaning herself.<p>

Mokou slipped away, somewhat pleased, and caught up to the rabbit in the forest. It was the first time she had seen Reisen since the party, so she embarrassed her by recalling her appearance and behaviour there in great detail. The Lunar rabbit shied off, trying both to avoid the subject and get Mokou to stop following her (the rabbits always did this, even the amicable ones, trying to avoid being the one to lead Mokou to their princess. Odd, Mokou thought, since they all knew she had known her location for centuries). Reisen was going too slowly for Mokou's tastes, encumbered by her pack (why didn't she just fly?), and Mokou was spoiling for a fight. After one last quip she took off for the Palace of Eternity.

More of Reisen's errands involved the library at the Scarlet Devil Mansion in the coming weeks, despite the fact that the two scholars kept to two meetings a month at most. A few times at first, and then more and more, they met in the library itself, although its availability was difficult to predict. Having seemingly no clocks, or even windows in its deepest stacks, they found they frequently lost track of time—especially since the librarian usually found herself drawn in as well. Only the piling china teacups and mounds of books awaiting re-shelving gave any indication as to how long they'd been there.

They each found that the others could test the boundaries of their expertise with little trouble. Although all were ancient and broadly schooled, the physician was best versed in the sciences and mathematics, the librarian in magic and the arcane, and the historian in literature and politics, as well as her nominal discipline. In many other fields, philosophy especially, they found themselves in close contention. In others, they were surprised to find how little any of them knew. For all the exercise was a welcome diversion.

Several months after she had first discovered Eirin in Keine's house, Mokou heard them speaking there again. She had flown there as twilight was settling in, and she suspected that the strong wind had masked the sound of her approach. She turned to sneak off as she usually did on these rare but predictable occurrences; there was nothing for her to add to the conversation. This time something was different though, and she froze when their words reached her.

"...I don't mean to say that my sympathy for them is gone," Keine was saying, her voice hinting at guilt. "But it doesn't bother me as much now. I feel bad for even thinking that. I hate to see her hurt."

"I do too," Eirin cut in. "Both of them." She was saying something else, and Mokou strained herself to hear over a sudden gust of wind. "...you trust my sincerity, no doubt."

"And we tolerate it. It seemed so simple at first..." Keine hesitated, "actually... I kind of resented you both. And even Mokou later, for being so..." she paused and reconsidered her phrasing, "...stubborn."

It was plain that this topic had never been broached between them to this degree: their attention was more on their tea than each other. Mokou hovered, floating out of sight to the roof, where she glided a few inches from its surface to take shelter from the wind. Both were much more audible now. Eirin was the first to breach the uncertain silence, and Mokou could hear the sound of pages being flipped.

"This was an interesting find. Actually, I'm surprised it took us this long to get." She read a few pages. "They've developed some interesting printing technology in the outside world, don't you think?"

"What?" Keine began indignantly, but unable to completely conceal her relief at her well-received confession. "Printing? You're supposed to be interested in the story! It's about your... ahh..." Keine trailed off with an understanding murmur.

"I've read it before," Eirin smiled. "In less flowery prose, maybe, and without illustrations, but it's surprising to see how popular the story still is. This is an expensive edition."

"You're surprised people still pay as much as this must cost, you mean, for a contrived and ancient myth." Eirin nodded. Mokou could see their backs through a row of drying persimmons (which she stared at for a moment, suddenly hungry and slightly frustrated) if she floated down far enough, holding her hair to her chest. They were sitting at adjacent sides of a square table, inspecting their prize. "Prince Kuramochi..." Keine tapped the page with a finger. "It seems to have been fashionable to change the names of characters for satire."

"It was that way on the moon as well," Eirin said. "They kept the Princess's name, though, and I'd wager that it's well-enough known that he's meant to be a Fujiwara even today. _The_ Fujiwara, in a way. Satirical masks are often meant to be rather thin in my experience."

"You're probably right."

Neither of them spoke again for a while, the wind filling the silence. Mokou wondered if all of their conversations were so abrupt, but she suspected not. She had a pretty good guess what they were reading.

They had run out of tea, so the schoolteacher excused herself and returned with a fresh pot after a while. She must have had to boil a new kettle. Mokou used the time to settle herself more comfortably, and the interlude seemed to relieve the tension.

"This is not as easy to discuss as I thought it might be," Eirin began after taking a small sip of the still-too-hot tea. Keine nodded. The pair looked like they felt they were being watched, and Mokou was suddenly self-conscious, withdrawing to the rooftop. Very slowly, she inched back to the edge. The two still sat in silence. Mokou was slightly surprised to realize that she had only just now noticed that both had doffed their headgear: they both looked less official without ornamenting their hair.

"It was bound to come up, Eirin. We're too involved to avoid it forever." Keine reached for the book that still sat on the table, but stopped herself before she touched it. Foolishly, they had let the tension return. Mokou held her breath. Eirin was hesitating to speak.

"...When I told you about the night I was arrested..."

"The night you were both arrested, you mean?" Keine asked.

"Right." Eirin was unfolding something else now, a bunch of thin, brown parchment. "Well, I said I'd continue that story if you wanted to hear it. Did you read this?" Mokou couldn't tell what Eirin was holding up, but she knew she had never seen the sheaf of papers before.

"Of course I read it, you sent it with the book and the medicines. I always do my homework." Eirin stopped rustling the sheets, and the two seasoned academics shared a glance before a tired chuckle.

"Well, what's left of the story will take some time to tell, given how long it took for me to introduce it, so if you don't mind sacrificing at least this and some of our next session..." Keine nodded, pouring a cup of tea.

The wind had died down considerably, and the blue sky had had darkened. A few pinprick stars were beginning to show.

Mokou stifled a shudder at the realization of how entrenched she had become. Her muscles ached from stillness and the gradual fall in temperature, and for a moment she thought about floating silently away. Nothing in her responded to the impulse, though, and she buried a tiny twinge of guilt with anticipation. The guilt seemed misplaced to her. Listening to conversations that she wasn't supposed to hear sometimes seemed to have become a pastime. Perhaps it was just this case, but a part of her wanted to leave...

The steam from the tea stole Mokou's attention. It looked warm and soothing, and her mouth seemed dry as she suddenly felt the cold more acutely. Eirin began to speak.

"I hope you understand that this isn't a story that can be told without at least a little inclusion of lunar politics." Mokou turned to lie on her back, her eyes following the moderately-sized crescent moon chasing the sunset. "The story of the Princess, and my story especially, were involved so deeply. This book I found says almost nothing about us, but remember that it is a story from another perspective. Our perspective is inseparable from the environment in which our betrayal germinated. I left off after the Marshal left me, I think?" Keine must have nodded, because Eirin went on. Mokou soaked in the story, ready to disentangle as much as she was being told as more came, still lacking familiarity and slightly surprised that this story had eluded her for centuries.

"Well, when he left me, I'm told he went straight to the Princess's chambers. Kaguya has never brought it up, but while she was in exile I managed to discover things that had been previously kept from me. Military sentencing can be quite brief, especially since there are fewer punishments and less leeway amongst them. What is important is that she was sentenced to death, despite the legal nightmare that that entailed.

"The Marshal, you'll remember, was a lawyer. He was actually several other things, as most Lunarians are: we live so long that many take up multiple vocations, progressing through several careers and fields. The questionable legal status of immortals was compounded by the fact that Kaguya was a royal, and the greatest threat to the crown would have been someone who saw this opportunity as one to claim a permanent link to the throne: it was not unheard of to have marriages under duress eventually legitimized, and that was not the only way it could have been done. Exile was the clear choice from the beginning, as it could strip her of incomes and lineage—even temporarily—but the overreaction of certain advisers due to the prompting of several opportunists pushed the military to seize the capital. Much of our military law proscribes death, and it can act more clearly on beings of questionable legal status. The marshal had little choice.

"It was a ridiculous affair. Failed executions are attempted repeatedly every lunar day, so about monthly. The moon returned to civil law quite quickly, but it took the Crown's lawyers almost a year to prepare a legal initiative that was both certain to work and that wouldn't involve a decree, which were both crucial to avoiding severe political backlash. She was then exiled." Eirin drank her tea. "That much you might have guessed."

She had to draw a hoarse breath before continuing.

"I was disgraced. My enemies, although many were charismatic charlatans, seemed overnight to have been vindicated in their positions. My friends and colleagues found that knowing me had become a dark badge, easily discarded for some, but not so much for others, especially those whom I had taught. The Marshal was one of them, and given his political sympathies to me as well as his unfortunate task of needing to step in and invoke a temporary legal loophole for the sake of ongoing stability, some gave him the nickname of 'The Condemned', since he seemed more damned than the girl he was meant to condemn. His colleagues defended him against the slander, but I suspect that some of them were responsible for starting the whispers. Recall that their office was on the verge of abolition, so retaining it would be tantamount to demotion after the Watatsuki's were installed. Every Marshal was jostling for an advantageous position to fall back on rather than implicitly fall one or two ranks.

"It is not that what he had to do was itself ridiculous or deserving of scorn. It is the fact that it could be perceived that way, and used by others to his detriment. In the political environment of the Moon, many actions, even the most benign, are often interpreted through as many layers of preconception as possible. The tendency of the public is to overreact, and they can almost always be made to do so by someone whose interests it might serve."

The wind had picked up again, and Mokou brought her arms to her chest. Less seemed to be coming of this than she had anticipated and she was beginning to consider slipping away into the night.

"For a year, I visited the Princess's chambers regularly, and I was granted access on medical pretexts as I was promised. I had lost almost all influence: even those who would have been willing to help me refused to because of the potential consequences of being caught doing so. The Princess was always somewhat withdrawn when she lived on the moon, so her behaviour was not unusual to me, but eventually she brought something up that I should have predicted.

"Bear in mind that I was still imprisoned, cut off from everything. It was only from her that I learned what the Marshal had done." Eirin was unfolding the papers again. "Since you've read this, you know what I'm about to say." Mokou's attention came back a little.

"She was stripped of everything that might entertain her, but was given a copy of a research document which I had helped prepare ages before. I tried to convey some of it in this letter to you, Keine, but the document was much longer and included much more input from others. Kaguya kept it from me at first..."

It was odd for Mokou, to hear Eirin use Kaguya's name rather than her title. "...but when she confronted me with it it became obvious that I had crushed her." Eirin's voice had fallen to a whisper, and Mokou discovered she was straining to hear. So much for slipping away. Eirin drew in a shaky breath and went on as steadily as she could.

"It was a highly praised work. Convincing and thorough, it delivered a strong case to view immortals without humanity, or at least that even if interaction—effective interaction even—was possible, not to lose sight of the implications of their nature. Creatures totally beyond hope or redemption, even if not immediately destroyed. Kaguya knew I believed it, and it convinced her, too, I think. When she didn't die, the first time, under the watch of guards and soldiers, I think she saw herself for the first time as something separate from humanity, reconciliation impossible. If you've ever considered immortality I'm sure you've come to a similar conclusion, whether or not it was after you met Mokou and Kaguya.

"She read it again and again, I'm told. It was part of her sentence. I think it numbed her more quickly to the pain and isolation, but it numbed her to me too, and then I was alone. That felt worse, much, much worse than the guilt that came before, from my betrayal of the Lunarians. Until I came to earth and saw her again, it felt terrible."

Eirin stared into her tea. Mokou exhaled, slowly, listening to her own breath. The wind was gone, and a light dew had moistened her clothing. She shivered, shocked that she had become so quickly enraptured.

"It's getting late, I won't get to the Earth tonight." Eirin said, but Keine kept the other conversation afloat.

"You were right, Eirin. You know that, about them, right?" Mokou froze at Keine's words. "We can't really call them human. I have thought about it, more and more. The prospect of dying has to have _some_ meaning to a human. People, maybe... could we? At least, I think people…

"...Maybe." Eirin mumbled, sounding less than confident. The silence between them asked their real question, and neither had an answer. What would they want to be called? An image slipped into Mokou's head, a memory of shattered green bamboo stalks glistening red with blood, and of her elation slipping away under the frightened gaze of the schoolteacher interloper. She could almost smell the warm, wet soil that they had displaced and the blood that was soaking into it. Keine had watched few of her fights with Kaguya, stepping in to stop them more than once at first. She had never been able to see them in the same way as others did.

Eirin and Keine were still talking, but Mokou had drifted skywards, directing herself towards the forest but away from Eientei. The wind grew more deafening as she picked up speed, but she could not get it to drown out her thoughts.

* * *

><p><em>Sorry for the ultra-delay. If you haven't read my profile, I was sick last week and couldn't do a thing. I'd recommend reading it since I will include more on publishing time updates there.<em>

_I think this will have six chapters, including the prologue and epilogue, so not very long. This chapter and the next will be particularly short. I know there's a ton of talking, but I want this to be what Mokou hears, next chapter will probably be a lot like this. Sorry if it seemed rushed and not thought out, I'm actually not that happy with this one. Tell me what you think, I'm probably going to revise it midweek. In progress, right?_

_Cheers._


	4. Mokou in the Village

_If it's any consolation, you don't hate me any more than I hate myself. Sorry for the inexcusable delay. Moving forward, I will probaly continue making minor changes to previous sections until I finish this story, so if you're reading this like a serial (with a deadbeat author) I'm sorry._

**Mokou in the Village**

_The Emperor was still too entranced with Kaguya-hime's beauty to stifle his feelings…. after he had entered his palanquin he sent this verse to Kaguya-hime:_

"_As I go back to the palace my spirits lag; I turn back, I hesitate, because of Kaguya hime who defies me and remains behind."_

_To this she wrote in reply,_

"_How could one who has lived her life in a house overgrown with weeds dare to look upon a jewelled palace?"_

* * *

><p>Mokou's course brought her over one of the outlying arms of the village, and flying low she found she could follow the streets and alleys that were illuminated by the soft glow of flickering lanterns and light escaping through open windows. Ahead, a sharp edge abruptly ended in darkness, in what Mokou knew to be a ring of grassy meadows and grazing pasture. Beyond it in this direction one would eventually reach the bamboo forest, but this was not a region that bordered it immediately. A spur covered in tall conifers, spaced out around the stumps of their harvested cousins, was the most immediate obstacle in this direction, and had been used by the village as a source of emergency firewood for some time.<p>

Mokou set herself down a few hundred paces from the edge of the town, banging her knee roughly on the packed dirt and gravel of the street. She sucked a deep breath through her teeth, thankful that nobody had witnessed such an embarrassing act of clumsy impulsiveness result in a botched landing. The pain itself was mild, but it dragged her attention from her wandering thoughts and surprised her by revealing how distant from the world she had let herself become.

Nobody was in the street, but even if anyone were they would probably have left her alone. Her introduction to the village had admittedly been strained, but a few generations had by this point grown familiar with the lonely girl in the forest who would lead them to medicine in their times of most serious stress.

Some of the houses looked very asleep, while others had a few fires still burning strong, people finishing off their evening chores and getting frustrated with their misbehaving kids. Only one person saw her, a toddler gaping out the window in the last building before the border. She smiled, before turning and hopping the ditch between the path that skirted the village and the grassy, bushy field beyond. Upon landing she grimaced: she had forgotten about her knee.

After a few minutes of stumbling through the tangle of brambles that clutched at her ankles and struggled to find purchase on her heavy trousers, Mokou reached one of a few thin dirt tracks that cut into the soil and meandered off into the forest. Deciding that it would probably be faster and easier on her smarting leg, she let the track lead her and slipped back into her thoughts, diligently avoiding the subject on the minds of Keine and Eirin and focusing instead on what she remembered it felt like to be bored, maybe, or drunk.

In the trees, after a dozen switchbacks or so, her thoughts were once again stolen from her. She froze at the sound of an animal, senses springing to life and burying her mind with information. The temperature, the moisture, the mossy smell of the ground all came to the forefront of her attention.

It was too clumsy to be a predator, she decided, so it was definitely too clumsy to be prey. A youkai then. Probably not a threat (inasmuch as anything could be a threat to her), but it was still worth being careful. Being killed by youkai was more often than not a humiliating experience.

She hovered, a little below the treetops, and slipped through them like she were swimming through seaweed towards the noise. As the details of the situation resolved themselves they seemed to make less sense. The creature was perched on a low branch, and looked like it was struggling to free itself from something, becoming more and more frustrated. As it did, the branch shook, and it had to move closer to the trunk to stabilize itself. This continued for a moment, back and forth. Mokou didn't know what she was watching, she had never seen this behaviour before in animals or youkai, definitely not humans. _Humans…_

As soon as the thought occurred to her the creature slipped, and she hurled herself through the canopy with enough power to shatter the tree, taking off every branch that was too thick to bend at the trunk. The impact with the ground killed her instantly, but by the time she got there her body had been shredded anyway and she quickly recovered.

Despite the speedy resurrection Mokou could feel her heart pounding everywhere in her body and all of her extremities were trembling. Trying to stand without shaking, the situation before her resolved itself and confirmed her suspicions. Unable to contain her anger, she spun and blew apart the tree trunk with a blast of thermal energy that might have turned rock into glass, cursing with every breath as the still-foliated side pulled it down away from her.

The man lying on the ground was dazed and winded, choking on his breath more than Mokou was. A large gash across his forehead showed where the heavy branch had hit him and was saturating one side of his face in blood as he struggled to free his pinned arm. After shoving his probably concussed head out of a makeshift noose and burning through the knot on the branch Mokou easily shoved it aside. Had she been any slower to act the fall would almost certainly have broken his neck. This was probably the most surprising thing that could happen to anyone, Mokou realized. Being knocked down hard at the climax of a suicide attempt.

He was young, probably not even married yet. An apprentice to an artisan or a baker maybe. Keeping livestock was improbable if his knots were as cumbersome as the one in Mokou's hand. He tried to raise to his knees, coughing blood, shaking with a fear that Kaguya had never exposed as he tried to speak, struggling to push out even one word. Mokou knocked him back to the ground with a rough lash that left a mark on his cheek.

"Shut up!" She screamed, Expelling an entire lungful in a single cry. She wanted to pace, had to do something to convince her body to move, but it wouldn't. It was shaking and her breathing refused to succumb to her control, she could do nothing to slow it sown. He was sobbing now, almost every breath catching in his throat.

"I…"

"Shut. Up." Mokou growled this time, striking him hard between words. The few impulses that managed to trigger action in her unresponsive nerves all exposed her anger, if she had some kind of weapon she thought she might swing it clean through another tree. She whipped the stump beside them viciously before dropping, exasperated. "You're dead. Don't talk."

His nose was broken now, and Mokou knelt, burning the rope in her hands as she remembered what it had just about done. What _he_ had just about done. "Why would…" _Shit._ She realized she was about to cry. Her voice raised to a scream to mask the change in pitch that accompanied her tears."Why wouldn't you do anything else!"

She went to her knees and he drew back in fear, but she was strong and enraged, and dragged him back, holding him in a tight, quivering grip. When she didn't lash out he opened his clenched eyes a bit to look at her, but when she saw this she hit him again, twice in quick succession in the jaw, then the stomach. He recoiled, choking, struggling for breath between sobs. She considered breaking his fingers to keep him from trying again, but figured he'd be able to find some other method. Her teeth were clenched tight, and she realized she was salivating copiously. Her grip on his wrist was probably only just shy of injuring it.

"You could do anything else!" She yelled at him, spitting at the end. "Why wouldn't you try anything else! You were willing to die, weren't you? You're just some kid…" she paused, finally breathing steadily. "God dammit!"

"I don't know," he whimpered, "I don't know, I don't know… I don't know I don't know I don't know," he kept going, getting softer, the words stringing together in Mokou's head. The cold damp of the mossy ground was seeping into the fabric over her shins and knees, and even though she had just been resurrected the phantom remnants of the pain that had stung her kneecap a few minutes before was still present.

She dropped him at the edge of the village after a couple minutes flight, and he screamed when his aching frame hit the rough gravel. The attention of someone nearby must have been diverted, so Mokou disappeared before she could be seen. When she was halfway to Eientei it occurred to her that she could have brought him there, but the thought left no ripples of guilt on the surface of her mind as she let it sink to the bottom.

* * *

><p>Reisen was awake before sunrise on most days, but her master's absence meant she had to be awake even earlier to tend to her responsibilities as acting head of the household. Still a little groggy as she pulled on a clean uniform in the silence of the waking mansion, she realized it was a little too dark to properly fix her appearance. It didn't matter much—her long hair was straight and not prone to tangling—but she still sometimes envied the earth rabbits their simple range of nuanced little dresses that never seemed to wrinkle, and their short-cropped hair that never seemed to need attention. She was, however, not an earth rabbit, and she knew that some of what little authority she was able to exert over her cousins flowed from her lunar trappings, so she pushed the image of herself in a pastel-pink sundress and sandals out of her head and stepped out onto the veranda.<p>

Her early morning responsibilities went by without much trouble. Subordinates were relatively more responsive when Eirin was gone, and the load today was light. Ready to get a head start on some work before breakfast, she had barely slipped back into her blazer when she felt hands pulling at the pleats of her skirt. The four rabbits behind her stared up expectantly as she turned to face them, and before she had time to listen to them the urgency in their faces resolved itself. One was already a few yards away, and she nodded, adding the rough click of her shoes to the flat patter of bare feet on planks as they ran.

"Princess!" Reisen shouted. She was still always startled by this familiar sight.

"Ah, Inaba. Good morning." Kaguya said with a distant voice, as though her mind was on the infant sunrise, or as though she wasn't soaked in dirty blood.

Reisen went to her knees beside the sitting princess, hands instinctively reaching for the worst-looking gashes in clothing to see if the wounds below them hadn't been caused before her most recent resurrection. A little crowd was gathering, concerned murmuring filling the air, and some of the nearest rabbits were visibly agitated and struggling to keep from an outpouring of sympathy. It took pretty serious conditioning to make rabbits okay with gore, and in truth Reisen's own instincts were screaming likewise, but her household duties came before being a pet and her followers needed an example. She looked at the first four who had found her.

"Get hot water, a lot. Bring whoever you need." They jumped into action eagerly. Motivating earth rabbits might occasionally be a chore, but when it came to the princess there was always a consensus on urgency. "Get towels too, and a robe and slippers."

From experience she knew Kaguya preferred to have this much blood washed off outside, because the heat in the baths would make them smell slightly. "Cold water too, and find Tewi." Reisen's attention never completely left Kaguya while she was rattling off instructions, but now she turned herself back to the princess fully. "Are you still hurt, Princess?"

"No, Inaba. Just my foot, I cut it coming back. Everything else came before."

Reisen didn't bother to conceal the relief that came over her at those words, letting her inspection continue with no small amount of affection in her touch. She was not worried for Kaguya, but seeing her after a fight put her in no mood for the medical drill that Eirin would doubtlessly make her perform on the princess if her wounds were not excessively severe. Tewi came into her field of vision. "If Master is here, can you find her?" The little rabbit nodded and skipped off like she knew exactly where to look. "Nnn, you don't need to stand, Princess, just sit and rest."

"It's okay Inaba. I'll stand for a minute." Doing so revealed a horizontal tear over her stomach, and Reisen's hands went for it. The fabric fell open on the one side where the two sides of her shirt met. Whatever had torn her shirt open had doubtlessly torn her open too, and the image haunted Reisen's mind even as her palm reassured her that Kaguya's smooth abdomen was completely intact, with a steady heartbeat to boot.

"That was a bad one. Thick bamboo, snapped at an angle. I fell on it from pretty high, and it splintered as it went through. See?" She turned, showing the blood-caked back of her top. At this distance the jagged tears became obvious. They were much smaller and more numerous than those on the front, and showed where the splintered tree had made it through on either side of her spine. Kaguya began to shrug off her shirt, but Reisen stopped her, turning her so she could undo what bows remained. Kaguya withdrew her hands, smiling.

The hot water had arrived, along with a stack of towels and a screen, and the other rabbits had set a few down to collect the blood with their edges extending over the deck. Kaguya moved towards them, but had to nurse her foot more than she anticipated and looked like she might fall. Reisen caught her when she did, two other rabbits moving to support her as well, all holding her tightly.

"Inaba," she began, looking at them through a haze of fatigue. "Your clothes will be ruined."

"Don't concern yourself with that, Princess." Some extra laundry would be necessary today, but none of the servant-pets were about to loosen their grip on her. Kaguya would not normally have allowed breaches of her orders, but Reisen suspected she saw their agitation and was letting them deal with it. Soiling their clothes? Such a flimsy pretext would never be used in seriousness in a situation like this.

They pulled the screen in place when she was on the towels, undressing her and setting to work. Blood, both wet and dry, formed dark patches everywhere. Two scrubbed Kaguya's skin with wet cloths that were regularly replaced, two more set to working the grime out of her hair, and Reisen inspected the cut on her foot. It was worse than Kaguya had suggested, a long, deep laceration, but she cleaned it and put on some ointment, squeezing reassuringly when the princess tensed at the sting, finally sealing it with an adhesive cream meant for deep wounds.

Before long Kaguya just looked wet, so they wrapped her in dry towels before she was shivering too much and brought her in for a real bath, instructing the rabbits who hadn't let themselves get dirty to clean up and start on the laundry. Reisen thought she might get away with a quick hand washing and a new shirt, but a look in the mirror suggested otherwise. The princess dozed through a real cleaning, with soap and brushes and shampoo, and let fatigue overcome her in a bath while the half-dozen rabbits who had handled her mess helped each other with their routines. Most of their soaks were much briefer, as only the lucky two who had been called away from bath duty to help with the blood had any reason to stay.

Reisen was freshly dressed for the second time that morning when Kaguya came into the antechamber with a girl still towelling her off. Just before she could leave, as the princess was slipped into a new set of underwear, Eirin entered.

"Master," Reisen began, but Eirin ignored her.

"You were with Fujiwara last night?"

"Mm," Kaguya murmured in affirmation while her shirt bows were being tied. Eirin looked at Reisen expectantly.

"Not the worst, but much worse than usual," she admitted smiling apologetically. "She cut her foot too, I treated it."

Eirin lifted Kaguya's foot onto a bench. "This wasn't from fighting?" Kaguya shook her head. Eirin would probably have dismissed Reisen at this point, but Kaguya began speaking before she could.

"She was pretty vicious last night," Kaguya said, as if she were considering the outcome of a fight that had not involved her at all. "But her guard was down too, like she didn't care about defending herself." She pulled her foot into her lap and examined the sealed cut herself before she let the attendant rabbit pull on her final stocking. "And she was enraged if I stopped fighting back, or started to save my energy, or even just paced myself at all." Standing now, Kaguya looked nothing like the stomach-churning mess she had been an hour ago.

"She was eavesdropping on us earlier, when she was coming by and saw me at Kamishirasawa's." Said Eirin.

"Really?" Kaguya was the one to ask, but Reisen had almost done so too. The pair wore a similar, curious look. It was unusual to be given an explanation for Mokou's behaviour, and while Kaguya was regularly capable of extrapolating one, Reisen was definitely not.

"There was also an incident in the village. We followed her at a distance when she left."

Kaguya waited expectantly.

Reisen snapped back into her head before Eirin could begin, and realized that she was committing an indiscretion. "Sorry, if I'm not needed I'll excuse myself," she offered with a bow. Kaguya gave no indication, so she looked to Eirin, who again found no expectation in Kaguya's face.

"You can go back to work, Udonge. Good job this morning, from what I've heard."

Reisen left with a smile and a bow, more than a little happy. Her master would probably have a long list of criticisms later, but being praised by Eirin in front of the princess was still a treat worth savouring.

* * *

><p><em>I have trouble calling Eirin master, because it seems like it should conflict. I've been drawing a blank, but is there a common way to distinguish between a master over an apprentice or protege (Eirin) and master over a pet or servant (Kaguya)? Mentor, employer, owner, teacher, boss, all seem wrong for lots of reasons, but mainly because Reisen calls Eirin "Master" and Kaguya "Princess," leaving me hanging when I want a word to express the nature of the relationships differently.<em>

_I love story stats because I can tell how many people don't review (and other cool stuff like how many people read past chapter one of my stories. About one third, if you're interested. Wish I had comparative data). I know I'm the worst hypocrite ever, but please review if you've made it this far. I'm not even kidding about how much of a difference it makes. This chapter? I wrote it in three hours because I just noticed I had two new reviews on _Luck_, and now I'm probably gonna fail a few assignments. This wasn't even going to be in the original story, it's totally unplanned. Review anything I've written, it seriously draws my attention here.  
><em>

_Hopefully not too long before next update, a few weeks maybe? This kind of put the story on a clearer path for me._


End file.
